John 12:37 - Meaning and Application

Here we see the honour the Old Testament prophets gave our Lord Jesus. They foretold and grieved over the unbelief of many who would not believe in him. It was truly a dishonour and sorrow to Christ that his teaching met so little welcome and so much resistance. Yet this also removed the surprise and shame of it, because it showed that the Scriptures were being fulfilled.

Two things are said here about this stubborn people, and both were foretold by Isaiah, the prophet of the gospel. They did not believe, and they could not believe. First, they did not believe, even though he had done so many miracles before them, which should have convinced them. Instead, they opposed him.

Notice how many reasons Christ gave them to believe. He did miracles, many miracles, and the phrase means both many and great. This includes all the miracles he had already done. Even now, the blind and lame came to him in the temple, and he healed them (Matthew 21:14). His miracles were the main proof that he had been sent by God, and he depended on that evidence.

He stresses two things about these miracles. First, there were many of them. They were varied, repeated often, and every new miracle confirmed the ones before it. Their number showed Christ’s endless power, and it gave people many chances to examine them closely. If there had been any fraud, it would likely have been exposed in one of them. Since they were all acts of mercy, the more there were, the more good was done.

Second, these miracles were public. He worked them before them, not far away, and not in secret, but in open view before many witnesses. They saw them with their own eyes.

Yet the result was this: they still did not believe in him. They could not deny the facts, but they refused to accept the conclusion. The lesson is plain, even the clearest and strongest evidence will not create faith in hearts that are sinful and biased. These people saw, and yet they did not believe.

This fulfilled Scripture, as John says (John 12:38). It was not that these unbelieving Jews meant to fulfill the prophecy. They likely thought the Scriptures that speak of the church’s best people were being fulfilled in themselves. But in the end, the event matched the prediction exactly, so Isaiah’s words were fulfilled. The more unlikely an event is, the more clearly God’s foresight is seen in the prediction of it.

No one would have expected that the Messiah’s kingdom, supported by such strong proof, would meet such resistance among the Jews. That is why their unbelief is called a strange work and a wonder (Isaiah 29:14). Christ himself marveled at it, yet Isaiah had foretold it (Isaiah 53:1), and now it came to pass.

The gospel is called their report, or their hearing, meaning the message they had heard from God and from the apostles. It is like a report of a fact or a formal message brought before others. The prophecy says that only a few of those who hear this report will be persuaded to trust it. Many hear it, but few pay attention and receive it. “Who has believed it?” means, here and there one, but very few, and none of great number or rank.

It is also spoken of as something deeply sad that so few believe the gospel report. The word Lord is added here from the Greek translation, not from the Hebrew, and it gives the sense of a sorrowful account brought back to God by the messengers who found such cold reception. It is like the servant who came and told his master everything (Luke 14:21).

The reason people do not believe the gospel report is that the arm of the Lord is not revealed to them. That is, they do not come to know and submit to God’s grace in a real way. They do not personally learn the power and fellowship of Christ’s death and resurrection, where God’s saving power is shown. They saw Christ’s miracles, but they did not see in them the arm of the Lord.

Second, they could not believe, and they could not because Isaiah said, “He has blinded their eyes.” This is a hard saying, and it is difficult to explain. We know God is perfectly just and merciful, so we must not think there is any evil necessity forced on people by God’s counsel, as if he made them evil by mere power. God condemns no one by bare sovereignty. And yet it is said, “They could not believe.”

Augustine, when he came to these words, spoke with holy caution, unwilling to rush into this mystery. His judgments are just, but hidden. One way to understand “they could not believe” is that it means “they would not.” They were stubbornly settled in unbelief. Chrysostom and Augustine both lean that way. Scripture sometimes uses inability to describe a person’s fixed refusal, as in Genesis 37:4, where Joseph’s brothers “could not speak peaceably to him,” and John 7:7. This is a moral inability, like someone so used to evil that he has lost the habit of doing good (Jeremiah 13:23).

But the words go further: “they could not because Isaiah had said, ‘He has blinded their eyes.’” Here the difficulty becomes greater. It is certain that God is not the author of sin, and yet there is still a righteous hand of God to be seen in the blindness and stubbornness of those who keep refusing repentance and faith. They are justly punished for resisting God’s light and breaking his law.

If God withholds grace that has been abused, if he gives people over to the evil desires they have chosen, if he allows the evil spirit to do his work on those who resisted the good Spirit, or if in his providence he places stumbling blocks in sinners’ path that confirm their prejudice, then he blinds their eyes and hardens their hearts. These are spiritual judgments, like God giving idolatrous Gentiles over to shameful passions and corrupted Christians over to strong delusions.

This passage also shows the steps involved in conversion. First, sinners are brought to see with their eyes, so they can recognize the reality of divine things and gain some knowledge of them. Second, they understand with their heart, meaning they apply these things to themselves and not merely agree with them. They consent and receive them. Third, they are converted, truly turned from sin to Christ, and from the world and the flesh to God, as their happiness and portion. Fourth, God heals them, meaning he justifies them and sanctifies them, forgives their sins, which are like bleeding wounds, and kills their corruptions, which are like hidden diseases.

When God withholds his grace, none of this happens. The mind remains turned away from God.

Their growing dislike for God and the life of God can become so deep that it turns into a settled, hopeless hatred. Then the condition of the person, or even the nation, becomes desperate.

God’s Word also warns that judicial blindness and hardness, meaning a state in which God justly leaves people in their stubborn sin, will come on those who keep choosing wickedness. This was foretold especially about the Jewish church and nation. God knows all His works, and He also knows ours. Christ knew ahead of time who would betray Him and said so (John 6:70). That is one more proof that Scripture’s prophecies are true, and even the Jews’ unbelief can help strengthen our faith. It is also a warning to each person, so that no one should be caught by what the prophets warned about (Acts 13:40).

What God has foretold will surely happen. So, in a strict line of reasoning, it could be said that they could not believe, because God had already said through the prophets that they would not. God’s knowledge is so sure that He cannot be wrong about what He sees ahead, and His truth is so complete that He cannot lie in what He foretells. That is why Scripture cannot be broken.

Still, it is important to notice that the prophecy did not name specific individuals. So no one could say, “This man or that man could not believe, because Isaiah said it.” Instead, it pointed to the whole Jewish nation, which would keep on in unbelief until its cities were ruined and left empty, as the next verses say (Isaiah 6:11, Isaiah 6:12). Yet even there, God reserved a remnant, a small remaining group, as in “a tenth” (Isaiah 6:13). That kept hope open for individuals, because each person could still ask, “Why may I not be part of that remnant?”

The evangelist then shows (John 12:41) that the prophecy reached beyond Isaiah’s own day and mainly pointed to the Messiah’s time. “These things said Isaiah when he saw His glory and spoke of Him.” In the prophecy, we read that this message came to Isaiah (Isaiah 6:8, Isaiah 6:9), but here we are told that he said it with Christ in view. Nothing was spoken to him as a prophet that was not first spoken to him by God, and nothing was spoken to him that he did not later pass on to those he was sent to serve (Isaiah 21:10).

The vision Isaiah had of God’s glory is here called a vision of Jesus Christ’s glory: “He saw His glory.” That shows that Jesus Christ is equal with the Father in power and glory, and that praise belongs to Him as well. Christ had glory before the world was made, and Isaiah saw that glory.

It is also said that the prophet spoke of Him. In one sense, the words seem to be about the prophet himself, because the commission and instructions were given to him there. Yet they are also spoken of Christ, because all the prophets bore witness to Him, and all of them pointed ahead to Him. They spoke of Him in this way, that for many people His coming would be not only useless, but harmful, like a message that brings death. Someone might object to His teaching, “If it came from heaven, why did the Jews not believe it?” This passage answers that question. It was not because there was no proof, but because their hearts were hardened and their ears were dull. Christ was spoken of as being glorified even in the ruin of a stubborn crowd, as well as in the salvation of a chosen remnant.